Defender
Defender is a 1981 horizontally scrolling shooter video game developed and published by Williams Electronics for arcades. It was released in Japan by Taito. It is set on an unnamed planet where the player must defeat waves of invading aliens while protecting astronauts. Development was led by Eugene Jarvis, a pinball programmer at Williams; Defender was Jarvis's first video game project and drew inspiration from Space Invaders and Asteroids. Defender was demonstrated in late 1980 and was released in March 1981.
Summary from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA, read 5 September 2026.
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- Released
- 1981
- Developer
- WMS Industries
- Platforms
- 3 systems
- Critics
- Not scored
- Steam Deck
- Unknown
- Download
- Not stated
The record
| First released | 1 January 1981 |
|---|---|
| Developer | WMS Industries |
| Publisher | Atari, Inc., Shockwave, Entex Industries |
| Platforms | Nintendo GameCube, Arcade, Xbox |
| Genres | First-Person Shooter |
Source. Catalogue facts from Wikidata Q1182593, seeded 30 August 2026.
How long is Defender? How long to beat it
Total play time for Defender is about 4.6 hours to do everything, and around 0.6 hours to reach the end of the main story. These are player-submitted times from HowLongToBeat, not our own, shown with the number of players behind each.
| How you play | Hours | Players logged |
|---|---|---|
| Just the main story: straight through the critical path | 0.6h | 11 |
| Completionist: everything: 100% the game | 4.6h | 2 |
Source: HowLongToBeat community submissions, read 2026-10-19.
Where Defender sits on the grid
The grid places every game in the catalogue on measured axes rather than on an opinion. This is where Defender lands on each map it has the data for, with the share of the catalogue it beats on each axis.
- Year
- 30ahead of 0% of the catalogue
- Reach
- 36ahead of 77% of the catalogue
Percentiles are against the games that carry a reading on that axis, not the whole catalogue: counting a game with no figure as a zero would flatter everything that has one. How the grid works.
What readers say about Defender
Reviews written by people who have played it. These are separate from the GamingPickz Score and are never averaged into it: that score comes from thousands of Steam reviews with a sample-size correction, and a handful of unverified ratings would distort it rather than improve it.
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Where Defender appears
The ranked lists and finder pages Defender qualifies for, from its own genre and platform to what it takes to run.
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Common questions about Defender
What platforms is Defender on?
Defender is available on Nintendo GameCube, Arcade, Xbox. It first released in 1981.
Who made Defender?
Defender was developed by WMS Industries and published by Atari, Inc., Shockwave, Entex Industries.
How long does it take to beat Defender?
about 0.6 hours for the main story, 4.6 hours to complete everything, from HowLongToBeat's player-submitted times. These are community medians, so your own run may be shorter or longer.